Replacing the clutch spring is pretty simple,and seems to be something all Redcat owners have done or will do as the factory spring doesnt hold up to well. Even if it breaks it can still be used again providing the break happened somewhere around the spot where the ends of the spring meet.

Symptoms of a broken spring are very obvious. If the vehicle can be started while suspended but not while the tires are on the ground,or if the vehicle wont stand still while at idle and the engine dies when brakes are applied its probably the clutch spring. Also,with the engine off,if the clutch bell spins with resistance and a metal on metal noise can be herd from inside the clutch bell,the spring has come loose. *Note* Having the idle on the engine set to high can also cause the clutch to engage. And having the idle set to low can also cause the engine to die when brakes are applied as it will close the air intake of the carburator to much,thus stalling the engine.

Ok lets get started. First you'll need to remove the four screws holding the engine to the chassis (pic 1),you'll also need to loosen the grub screw in the tip of the exhaust pipe (2.0mm) which secures the exhaust pipe to the chassis. With the engine out of the vehicle you'll need to remove the clutch bell (2.5mm) (pic 2). Pull the clutch bell off taking care not to lose any of the washers under the screw and the washer behind the clutch bell (and be sure you put them on exactly how they came off!). If you have a replacement clutch spring or if you've managed to reuse the old one this is the trickiest part,have the ends connected together and ready to go. I recommend using both thumbs for this but I needed a free hand to take the picture. Grasping the engine in your hands,slip the spring over the tip of the crank shaft and use your thumbs to roll the spring on and around the clutch shoes working from one point outwards,evenly in an upward motion as show in pic 3. Do it slowly and with caution as you dont want to overstretch the spring,it may take a couple of tries as these things require alot of force and can slip out from under your fingers.

If everything went well and the spring is secured in its little groove on the clutch shoes then your ready for assembly,pretty much in the same manor you took it all apart! For the last part once the engine is back together the gear mesh will need to be reset. One way this can be done,is to take a piece of notebook paper and run it between the clutch bell/gears and then snugging the engine/clutchbell up against the spur gears and bolting it down and removing the paper (blue locktite is recommended on engine screws as nitro vehicles have ALOT of vibration). If the gears are to close they will spin with resistance with a clickity feel,and if set to far apart the power from a nitro engine can easily chew the teeth right off a spur gear. Pic 4 shows how my gear mesh is set after assembly. Notice how there is a space between the teeth of the clutchbell and spur gears but the teeth still have a good amount of contact surface and still spin freely.

Well thats its,not a whole lot to it but stretching the spring over the shoes is the hardest part. The clutch shoes can also be removed if you've purchased the "clutch slice" assembly if you dont want to fuss with springs or if you wish to replace/upgrade. The large E-clip is the only thing securing the shoes to the flywheel and can be removed by using a narrow flathead screw driver. Stick the screw driver in between the E-clip and crank shaft and slowly turn the screwdriver,this will force the E-clip out but becarful cause these things can go flying off pretty easy!

Before you take your engine off the chasis for the first time, turn the car upside down and take a PERMANENT marker and draw circles around ALL four of the screws that are holding the engine in to the chasis. SO, when you put the engine back on, all you have to do is line the four screws back up inside the circles and you wont have to worry whether the engine is in its correct factory position or not.
(I'll post a picture when I get home from work.)

I have taken my engine off three times already and never have to worry if it's put back on in the right place matching up with the gears.

This can turn into a nice little FAQ for us new guys if everyone adds their tips here.

Hey nitrosteve where did you get your clutch bell from? The one in the picture looks a lot better made than the ones that come with the cars. Sorry if you've already answered this in another thread. And great job with the tutorial man.

Thanks guys ,I think this could turn in to a good FAQ thread as well,especially if everyone adds in there tips,tricks and advice. Good point bspate. And the clutch bell/spur gears are the same ones that came with my Tornado,the clutch bell does shows very slight signs of wear but overall seems to be holding up quite well. So what other kind of FAQ's could come in handy?

Probably one of the hardest things to do when you first get into this hobby is learning how to tune your engine. One of the problems I first had when I got into nitro was simply realizing what everything was and where the adjustment screws were. Well anyways, here's a picture of the adjustment screws.

The following are what the factory settings are incase you ended up tuning things to the point where the car won't start anymore:
High Speed Needle (HSN) - Turn the screw all the way down (clockwise) but don't tighten it. Then unscrew it 2 1/2 to 3 turns (Counter Clockwise).
Low Speed Needle (LSN) - Should be flush with the collar.
Idle Screw Adjustment - Take off your air filter and make sure your throttle is at idle. Then make sure that the opening in the carb is about 1mm.

Hope this helps. If anyone wants to add anything to this feel free to.

As for tuning idle mixture i read great trick on how to do this. Make ur engine run at idle then pinch fuel cable (engine will stall), but before it stalls it should rise rpm a bit. If it doesnt rise at all - u run too lean. If it raises hundreds of rpm - u run too rich. It took me 5 minutes (it is almost week that i have my first nitro) and my engine now works great. Then u adjust idle speed (gap on throttle). Set idle speed so that clutch doesnt engage. As for high rpm needle u have to try your car at high speed. Mine was too lean and at half open throttle it didnt want to gain rpm. Unscrewed it half a turn at a time and now it rockets from 0 to max without hesitation. IMPORTANT NOTICE, for tornados xp/xl and alike use hot glow plug (helps to tune idle speed). At first i used OS R5 (almost coldest one) and 5 geeks coulnt tune it, changed to OS A3 (one of the hottest) and tuned properly in 10 minutes

well this has everything I have been looking for.. I am pretty sure my clutch spring was broken when I opened the box.. (LAME)
and this has that awesome pic of the idle screws.. ( I had no idea where to look the instruction manual makes them all look like they are the same screw)

Hey all, this is my first post on rc universe even though i've been browsing thru the site a while now. I have an himoto Syclone Pro 1/10 scale buggy which is exactly the same as tronedo XP.
Last weekend my throttle servo died and i'm looking to replace both the throttle and steering servos with more durable and stronger servos, can anyone suggest a good replacement?

The gears in the 2 speed transmission use centrifical force to shift. So once you get going fast enough they'll automatically shift into second. When you slow back down first will automatically kick back in. You'll know that it shifted because you'll hear the engines rpms drop just like in a real car. You can also adjust for the shift point, incase you want second to engage earlier or later.

The first picture is how the whole deal works. Baisically when you're running your car eventually you'll go fast enough to where the little arm swings up and then the tab on the second gear hits it and it becomes engaged. When you slow down the arm folds back down and the tab is no longer caught on it and then you'll be back in first gear.

The second picture is of the screws to adjust it.

Quote:

ORIGINAL: chubbysuncle

loosen the set screw to engage earlier tighten for later. Too tight never shift, too loose falls out and gone! If you adjust this and take it out, DON'T LOSE THE SPRING AND LITTLE BALL!, and put blue loctite on it. It has to be at least flush with the clutch or else it'll catch on the 2nd gear engagement tab and lock the car in second. I think factory setting is about 1-2 turns in from flush. If you still get no shift to 2nd you'll need to remove the trans and clean and check all gears and clean out the clutch of sand grit etc. that may be in it. Also make sure the steel pin is in the 2nd gear clutch tab.

Thank chubbysuncle for that info . Gotta give credit where it's due

The third picture is from the bottom of the car just showing you where the screws are.

Thanks for the credit Popper! At Poppers suggestion I am reposting my clutchbell assembly pics to help explain how the clutchbell is installed a little more clearly. Nitrosteve did a great job but I've got some pictures that I know some of you like more!.
When your changing your spring or shoes on the clutch take note as Nitro said on the order that you are removing the parts. I'm going to assume you've got the engine out and set to go. Get a clean well lighted area and get a small white towel to work on. If you drop a small screw it won't go bouncing all over and should show up easy on the white. Also it'll keep things clean. Before you start pulling stuff apart checkout the play in the clutchbell. Does it have alot of back and forth play? Does it wiggle back and forth? Take a note of any of these problems because you don't want it to do that when you're done here. Holding the flywheel use an allen wrench and remove the screw at the end of the clutchbell. There should be a very small lockwasher, 1 small flat washer and 1 or 2 very thin larger washers.Under that last washer is the outer bearing. It'll come off and stay in the bell for now. At this point hold the engine with the clutchbell pointed up and lift off the clutchbell. Did the inside bearing stay on the shaft? If it did you need to replace the clutchbell if the teeth are worn or bent. If the teeth look good then we may be able to fix this later. If the bearing stayed in the clutchbell great. Turn the clutchbell over and see if that outer bearing falls out. If not thats good unless it makes noise then you can push it out with a small piece of wood and replace it. There should be 1 more of those thin larger washers on to of the e clip that holds the shoes in place. With the engine sitting on the pullstart clutch pointed up, line up the 2 pins on the flywheel in a 12:00 and 6:00 position. If you are changing the clutch shoes look carefully at which holes the pins go thru on the shoes. they should be on the leading end of the shoes. You'll see in my pic. OK you've got your new spring and/or shoes on. Clean off any crud from those parts you took off and put 1 of those thin washers back on the shaft. Next is 1 bearing, the clutchbell, the outer bearing, 2 thin washers, the smaller flat washer, the lockwasher and the screw. See Picture. Back to those bearings. I used Locktite 1 minute bond to "glue "the bearings into the clutchbell. The bearings should fit snugly into the clutchbell. If they wiggle around even a little you're gonna have problems with your spur gear. With all of your parts back in place tighten the screw down and check the movement of the clutchbell. It should spin freely, no grinding. It shouldn't wobble around on the shaft. If it does check those bearings! If its to tight and is hard to spin take it apart and check the washers and you can try and move 1 of the thin washers to the inside. Order would be clutch shoes 2 thin washers, bearing ,clutchbell,bearing,1 thin washer, smaller flat washer,lockwasher and screw. Make sure the bearings are fully seated in the clutchbell. When you're satisfied with the fit and it's spinning smoothly remove that screw 1 last time and put Blue Locktite on it and tighten it up. You should be good to go!

How to save Videos to computer
Alright I know this isn't exactly r/c related and more of a computer tutorial but I thought it applied to us.
But anyways, I've noticed that a lot of people have been posting vids and they're all great. But some of the sites that you post them to don't give you the option to download the clips to your computer. You may want to download them for several reasons, especially if the video isn't playing correctly in your browser or it may be taking a long time to load.
But like everything computer related there's a way around that.

Now in order for this to work you need to be using the firefox browser(the best ever). If you don't have that download it here: [link=http://www.download.com/Mozilla-Firefox/3000-2356_4-10532870.html?tag=lst-0-2]Firefox Download[/link]

In the second picture you'll see that I went up to "Tools" in the menu bar and then clicked on "Page Info"

Then from there a window will pop up with several tabs as shown in the third picture. Click on the "Media" tab. Then from there scroll down the list untill you come across the movie file you want. They usually end in either .mov .avi .mpeg or .wmv They'll also usually display as "Embed" in the type column. Then you simply hit save as and pick where you want to put the file.

Simple as that. Now you have the movie saved to your computer so you can watch it anytime you'd like to. This also works with pretty much any other site if you catch my drift
Good Luck and happy downloading.